


Leash

by Aithilin



Series: Guardian Wolf [1]
Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Alternate Universe - Werewolf, Blind Character, Blind Noct, Fluff, M/M, Werewolf Nyx
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-23
Updated: 2017-06-23
Packaged: 2018-11-18 05:39:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,376
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11284821
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aithilin/pseuds/Aithilin
Summary: Nyx had been recruited to protect Noctis after an incident left the young prince blind.





	Leash

**Author's Note:**

> Definitely a mash-up of two of my AUs that I couldn't get out of my head.

Nyx had become a fixture in the Citadel ages ago. Just as much as the Shield or the other companions hand picked for the prince’s guidance and safety. He had been recruited when the prince was still young, still struggling with the strangeness of sight stolen by a daemon and being returned to a world that was no longer built for him. Nyx had been recruited first and foremost as a guard, as a protector, as a force of nature that served as the last line of defence for the young, blinded Noctis. He had been promised safety for those he could save from his homeland; recruited on the promise of keeping his family alive in exchange for adopting one young boy into his pack.

As a Wolf of Galahd, he trotted alongside the prince. Better trained, as the king liked to tease, than a traditional guide dog— smart enough to pick and choose the paths for the prince when not in the comfort of his own rooms. And it was easy to let the rumours spread to those who doubted the royal family, who would question the competence of a prince unable to see the threats facing their little kingdom and its last bastion. It was easy to let them think that the young prince tamed wolves. It was easy to settle the prince down as he hesitated at doorways and jumped at once-familiar but muted noises— it only ever took a press of soft fur against pale skin. It was easy to let himself serve as a reminder that there was something bigger and stronger and which had more teeth watching over the young prince that had been so badly broken. 

The ribbons were Crowe’s idea though. 

When young, Noctis used to hold on to his fur. When scared, or distracted, he used to tug and hesitate and stop, leaving Nyx to coax the young prince forward. Most days, before Crowe had made her suggestion over drinks, Nyx would simply change to his human shape and talk the prince through whatever had scared him. There would be soft words, reassurances, descriptions of what was ahead. And once satisfied, Nyx would shift back and the small hand of the preteen would fist itself at his scruff and the walk would continue. When Noct was younger, smaller, it had been easier to coax him forward. When he was in his early teens, it took more patience and more bargaining— more asserting himself with the firm reassurances of his position in his broken little pack, with the natural command that came to a seasoned alpha— to keep the prince on track. 

“You need a leash, Nyx.”

It had come over drinks and bad food. One one of the rare days when the prince was sequestered in the Citadel with his other companions or his father. During one of the rare nights he was able to rejoin his pack before the suggestion was accepted that they be removed from their Glaive duties to join him guarding Noctis. Guiding Noctis. Giving the poor boy something more interesting than the companions groomed for him or the staff of professionals who saw him as a duty and daily task. Where the image of the sightless prince flanked by his wolfish, wild guardians had become a more popular image in the city than of the young prince sheltered by his advisers and Shield. 

The idea hadn’t been implemented until an incident near the fortifications. Until the royals had made an appearance in one of the districts closest to the front lines, where the red dusts of Cavaugh still drifted over the solid wall and through the magical barriers, and the sound of daemons and shelling and war could still shatter the night if someone listened close enough. The idea had been implemented through an accident, where Noctis had been brought out to the edges of the city with his father as a sort of royal inspection as the fresh troops left and the surviving ones returned, and the king muttered softly to his thirteen year-old son about the war and the politics and the reasons behind the deaths they would publicly acknowledge later that day. As the royal Shields trailed close at hand, and the prince’s closest companions were always a few steps behind with the king’s personal guard. 

The idea of a leash had been implemented because there were traitors in the ranks. Terrorists who had wormed their way into a desperate military and had waited for this moment of exposure of the heart of the kingdom. The King was always protected first— he had his Shield, his Armiger, his magic. The prince was the easier target— the untrained, the weakened, the softer heart that could bleed more freely for a cause. 

The small pack of wolves had appeared where the prince’s personal Glaives vanished. The Shield had stepped into place and the friend and pulls the prince to safety, trailed and overtaken by the pack that had claimed the humans as their own years ago. And once safe— once the Glaive jacket, with all his decorations and embellishments had been draped over the prince to calm him— Nyx had settled over Noctis’ legs as Ignis tied one of the strips of thick material from the jacket around Noct’s wrist, and the other end around Nyx’s throat. Nyx ignored the tremble in the boys’ hands as he watched the chaos be locked down around them, as the king calmed only when he saw the wolves around his son and the barrier they lifted only for the familiar. 

“To help keep you from getting separated,” Ignis explained as he made the last knot that would be cut away later, once they were in the prince’s rooms, back in his tower. As he bound them together and limited the range of Nyx’s movements and freedom in the event of an actual fight before they got back to the safety of the Citadel. As he forced Nyx to trust that the Crownsguard would step in for their prince as much as their King. 

Crowe took credit when it became an actual staple to their excursions. 

There was a collar fashioned by Pelna— tracking, communication when human, unobtrusive— that he wore most days now. A lightweight leash concealed in the material used. The whole thing was designed to look like traditional Galahdian decoration regardless of their forms. One of the necklace collars from Libertus’ clan. Complete with the string of beads Noct had always liked to run through his hands when resting. 

Noct had laughed at him when he discovered the leash. When he ran his hand over the release hidden by Nyx’s fur and tugged the thing free as Nyx grumbled. He gave the thing a short tug, until Nyx gently took the prince’s wrist in his mouth, until the promise of sharp teeth and a nip forced the amused teen to release the material and let it recoil and snap back into place. Despite the easy release, the easy catch that promised to keep Noct close at all times, that promised to keep them from getting separated when they wandered, Noct still preferred to cling to Nyx’s scruff. Despite the ease of a collar, a leash, Noct still preferred to touch. He still preferred to run his hands through thick fur, hold on to the longer scruff, and smile as Nyx shook him off when he draped himself over the soft, warm body of the Wolf. 

They still kept the ribbons. Noct was twenty when he would catch them when Nyx shrugged his uniform jacket on or off. Noct would wrap one around his hand and pull his Glaive to him with a grin, and laugh as Nyx tried to untangle him. 

Noct was twenty when Nyx, human and whole and settling down for the evening by his prince’s side, teased the decorative strips of durable cloth from Noct’s hands as the prince slept. As he replaced the ribbon in those clutching hands with his own, as Noct twined their fingers and held on to him just as tightly as he ever grasped at fur. Noct was twenty and strong, and Nyx couldn’t imagine being without some sort of leash tying them together.


End file.
